>> michael: thanks for watching "the young turks." i'm michael shure. cenk uygur will be back tomorrow to host "the young turks." vip is next with john fugelsang. >> john: president obama gave his fifth state of the union address last night. there are many highlights, especially the moment where he mentioned governor romney and everyone in congress replied who? marco rubio proves it's possible

to sweat profusely when you're standing in near darkness. and the voting rights act. two things that could hurt republicans come election time: voting and rights. kim novak is 80 and it's the birthday of peter gabriel. it's henry rollins birthday. [ ♪ music ♪ ] japan good evening i'm john fugelsang. coming up it's ha st. zinger, not r atzenberger my bad. and marco rubio channels his

inner mitt romney before blaming god for last night's splashdown. and rand paul doubles the tea party's fun with the state of the united states address. president obama laid out legislative agenda including a hike to minimum wage. >> reader effort and determination with wages that allow working families to raise their kids and get ahead. >> john: he put it a little more strongly last night. >> obama: tonight, let's declare that in the wealthiest nation on earth no one who works full time should have to live in poverty and raise the federal minimum wage to $9 an hour. >> john: which sounds reasonable to me, to you, most americans but not to john boehner speaker of the house. >> when you raise the price of employment guess what happens you get less of it. >> john: that is not true. and that comes from a political leader who thinks billionaires who have it rough but poor

people have it too easy. the president laid out what he would do on the abraham/ing sequester that would push the economy into recession. >> obama: on medicare i'm prepared to enact reforms that will achieve the same amount of healthcare savings by the beginning of the next decade as the reforms proposed by the bipartisan simpson-bowles commission. to hit the rest of our deficit reduction target we should do what lourdes in both parties have already suggested, and save hundreds of billions of dollars by getting rid of the tax loopholes and deductions for the well-off and the well-connected. >> the >> the president's sequester that we want to sea happen, but when it comes to overcoming their miserable performance with hispanic voters, here's part of what he said about immigration

last night. >> right now leaders from the business labor law enforcement faith communities they all agree that the time has come to pass comprehensive immigration reform. now is the time to do it. >> john: so congressmen who were denouncing their fellow human beings as ill legals last fall are saying viva la raza. >> he used measured words that were productive with respect to immigration, i think that's an area where we have a good chance of getting something done. >> cenk: and if you believe house majority leader eric cantor, more issues could be settled as well. >> mr. president, we want to work with you. we want to set differences aside and come together to produce results for the people who sent us here. >> john: and by people who sent us here he means the koch brothers. i'm joined by congressman

barbara lee, the whip for the progressive caucus. thank you for joining us. >> happy to be here. >> john: glad to have you. what did you think of the president's speech. did he leave anything out that you wanted to hear from him? >> well, the president was eloquent he didn't pull any punches. it was a very inspiring speech. i have to tell you a couple of things. one is i was very happy to hear him talk about poverty and the poor. of course, i'm leading an effort to call for the establishment of a national plan, and a national strategy to eliminate poverty by cutting it in half in ten years. and the president in his speech talked about specific measures that would lift people out of poverty, such as raising the minimum wage, and pegging it to the cost of living.

he also talked about quality universal preschool for our young children to make sure that they have plea school early on. that's a strategy to lift many children out of poverty. that i was very pleased to hear him talk about the middle class but those who have worked so hard and still have not become middle income. that to me was a powerful statement. now we have a lot of work to do here on capitol hill to put forth this plan. >> john: i agree and i echo your sentiments. i was pleased and surprised by his desire for a $9 minimum wage. but itch to ask you the question again. as the whip fors house progressive caucus, was there anything that you wanted to hear that the president didn't get around mentioning. >> i wanted expedited withdraw from afghanistan. who knows how many more lives could get lost.

he took a step in the right direction by calling for 34,000 troops out. but again the timetable is much much too long. i don't want to see residual forces remain. we have to enforce the economic stability, help with afghanistan, especially with women, and all the sustainable initiatives that needs to be put in place. i wanted to hear about an expedited withdraw. i'll continue to fight for an expedited withdraw. i have my amendment which i'll put forward again that says no more funding for combat operation, only to protect our troops, bring them home in a safe and orderly fashion. >> john: millions of americans thank you for taking that fight to the president and to our republican friends. moving on to the sequester and

also on gun control speaker boehner wants to see what the senate comes up with first. i'm curious what your thoughts are on this. why would he want the democratic senate to take the lead on this issue. and would the senate-first help or hinder in the long run. >> i have no idea why the speaker uses this as a strategy. he used this when he failed on the prior debt ceiling negotiations. we need to pass gun safety and gun violence prevention out of the house. we need to start here. we have many sensible measures. we have a gun task force that has put forth a variety of measures which should be by bipartisan. we should put those on the moore. the victims of gun violence, their families, their communities, they deserve this. not only calling for a vote, but i say we should call for a vote, and we should call for these bills to be passed. i think what the president said last night and how he said it

was a call to arms for the country. people need to get on the phones e-mail and have their members of congress not be bullied by the nra and to support some of these gun safety measures. >> john: well, speaking of the nra i would have to say the most dramatic moment came at the end when the president calls for real action on gun violence. there seems to be a consensus that a bill expanding background checks could pass the house. does it look like those are lost cause force now? >> not lost causes, but an uphill battle. but again i do believe john, the american people are ready for these very sensible measures. it's going to be up to the public to insist that congress pass these measures. it's not lost, but we need to seize this moment. too many young people have died. i come can from oakland california. we have an unbelievable number

of homicides young people, children i've been to so many funerals. it hurts my heart. i raised two sons, babies getting killed. newtown really picked the conscience of america. hast night with many suffering and mourning the loss of their loved ones i think people have to step up and honor these families and communities by passing this legislation. s not going to be easy. >> john: congresswoman barbara lee democrat out of california, thank you for your time tonight. i love what you do and how you do it. come to new york sometimes. >> good to be with you. >> john: before we go to our next guest i would like to play a briefbriefly in last night's video. he started by citing the gunshot victim.

>> along with more that two dozen americans whose lives have been torn apart by gun violence. they deserve a vote. they deserve a vote. they deserve a vote. [applause] gabby giffords deserves a vote. the families of newtown deserve a vote. the families of aurora deserve a vote. the families of tucson and the countless other communities ripped open by gun violence, they deserve a simple vote. >> john: and many would say they deserve considerably more than just a vote. for more let's go to john rosenthal, co-founder of the advocacy groups top handgun

violence and common sense about kids and guns. and lori haas who was in the capitol for the president's speech last night as a guest of virginia congressman bobby scott. lori's daughter emily was shot and wounded during the 2007 rampage of virginia tech. i would like to start with you lori if i could. what was the mood in the room during the speech? and what were you thinking and feeling when the president made that call for congress to vote on these very simple proposals? >> i was elated and inspired frankly. it's time to take action. it saddens everyone. the collective parent in all of us, we look at those children from newtown who were shot and murdered, we just know we can do better. we can do a good job and get real meaningful legislation that will save lives. background checks for one. we must do a better job. we owe it to our families. >> john: was it a surprise to

see how many people didn't stand up for the ovation for gun control legislation? >> you know, it breaks my heart. i think that there is a total disconnect among some members of congress, and what i've likened it inside the beltway and outside of the beltway. they don't have a clue of how the american public feels about this issue. americans care about their neighbors, their friends their children and their loved ones, and their law enforcement. we don't want gun violence in our communities. we don't want it in our schools our movie theaters. everyone in america deserves to live free from gun violence and we need to do a better job. it's. demeanor--it's epidemic in this country. >> cenk: john, are you hopeful that even a background check will pass. >> i'm not even hopeful that

background check will pass. private gun sellers in 33 states and gun shows no background check. not even an i.d. requirement. just cash and carry. private gun sellers sell 40% of guns sold this year. they're primarily selling to people who can't pass a background check. i'm a gun owner i'm glad to have a background check run but criminals and terrorists can't pass a background check but it's perfectly legal for to you buy guns from private gun dealers. the fact that congress people think it's a hard vote to require a background check for criminals, the mentally ill and even terrorist who is come to this country to buy guns undetected at gun shows is how far we have to go. >> john: it's amazing that one can't sell a car to a friend without letting the state know about it. lori, are you hopeful that this time maybe we will see some meaningful action from congress on this issue?

>> yes, i absolutely am. the american people are not going to stand for this. it may take a while but i think it's absolutely going to happen. the energy, synergy, the demand and attention is clearly clearly far different than anything we've ever seen before. we know the path forward. we are determined to get there. yes, i'm very hopeful. i absolutely think it can happen in this congress. i'm working hard every day along with all of those families whose loved ones were killed and injured. i was in d.c. the last two days with over 120 gun violence survivors. we're lobbying congress and we expect our friends and family back home to do the same thing. >> john: i think lori is right that it may take a while to get this to happen, but with newtown still fresh in everyone's minds can the president shame congress into action? >> i'm not sure. he can, but i think the american public can over 92% of people

polled support a background check. even 75% of nra members and gun owners like myself support a background check. the n ra doesn't oppose the fact that when i go for a duck hunting license i'm limited to three rounds because we need to protect the duck population. but they don't support banning these high-capacity ammunition clips, 30- and 100 rounds designed to kill as many people as possible without reloading. if the american people call congress flood the switch boards with e-mails calls and letters there is a chance of this. but remember i've been at this since 1995. that is 600,000 dead americans from gun violence. just since newtown there has been almost 2,000 americans killed from guns. we're hearing the sequester and the debt ceiling is urgent. today 87 more people died from

gun violence. that's urgent. until the american people make it a priority and hold congress accountable they're going to continue to take their blood money contributions from the unregulated gun industry and shame on us for not holding our congress people accountable. if they don't vote on this issue soon we can change congress over this issue by their lack of responsibility. >> john: i certainly hope you're right. lori, i have to ask how is your daughter doing now? >> she's doing well. she's a teacher herself and doing well. she's recovered as has the 17 other students shot at virginia tech. a reis re-resalient bunch of young people. >> john: i thank you for your service on this very important issue that affects all of us. if you care about american lives you're on this side. john rosenthal and lori haas, whose daughter emily was wounded

in the 2007 massacre at virginia tech. to both of you thank you for coming on the show tonight. >> thank you for having me. >> john: what a pleasure. everyone stood up and cheered for voting rights, not quite everyone. that's next.

people with sore throats have something new to say. ahh ! mmm ! ahh ! finally, there's cepacol sensations. serious sore throat medicine seriously great taste. plus the medicine lasts long after the lozenge is gone. ahh ! mmm ! cepacol sensations. >> john: welcome back to "viewpoint." it's tame for the thing of--time for the thing of the day. it's correction of the day. once again this is live tv and

these things happen. while ad-libbing about the pope at the end of monday's f-bomb segment, i accidently said this. as archbishop of munich benedict then cardinal rather than joseph ratzenberger i clearly meant joseph ratzinger not john ratzenberger tv's cliff clavin from the show "cheers." some of my critics took this small error as an opportunity to discount my entire argument. and if misprow announcing something is the new precedent for discrediting an argument, perhaps this will finer finally shut up all of the those neo-cons who couldn't wait to invade iraq. >> tonight i'm announceing a, we

can fix this. and we will. the american people demand it, and so does our democracy. >> john: that was the sound of john boehner not clapping. who could ever disagree with that. let's go back to the end of that sound bite? mm-hmm that's vice president joe biden standing to applaud and as i mentioned there is house speaker john boehner remaining seated, not clapping anand looking completely miserable. i wonder why that may be. here to join us is ari berman, contributing writer to the nation. who just wrote a brilliant piece titled "why are conservatives trying to destroy the voting

rights act." it appears only party stood up for the concept. is this especially telling? >> i think it's an unfortunate fact for our democracy that we have our party that by and large is supporting the right to vote. and another party that has done everything possible that it could in the last few years to restrict the right to vote. i don't think that's good for a healthy democracy to have one party that is for democracy. and it was telling that boehner didn't clap for that. he didn't get up when president obama introduced the 102-year-old woman who waited six hours to vote. >> john: in your article you talk about the voting rights being he would up in 2006 by a vote in the house that was 390-33.

now it's under attack by a seemingly majority of conservatives. >> it's a disconcerting shift. there was bipartisan agreement on the continuing need for the righting rights--the voting rights act. there are different reasons why it has come under siege. the party itself is more white more southern. >> it's not because there are more southern white people but more have been driven away. >> we also saw after obama's election--this is the big thing that obama got 80% of the minority vote in 2008. and republicans thought we can't get that minority vote. let's try to suppress it instead. instead. then there was this campaign under the radar by conservatives to pump money into groups whose express burns is to challenge laws like the voting right act.

there is a whole checks to find cases, challenge it, and they now have a receptive ear with john roberts as chief justice. >> john: can you explain who ed blum is and what his role is in challenging the voting right act. >> he runs a group that is set up to challenge laws like affirmative action. blum is a guy who is a stockbroker. he ran for congress in texas. he lost. he decided the "e" voting right acts was the reason why he lost. he lost to an african-american so he decided he didn't like the voting right acts. he has gotten money from a consortium from "donors trust ." it gets money from a who's who

including charles koch of the koch brothers. and and so what happened donors trust gave blum a lot of money. he has $1.2 million in the last five years that has allowed him to pay for major law firms that go before the supreme court. >> john: it's mystifying when you consider the g.o.p. is publicly saying we need to do more things to attract non-conservative non-white male voters. is there an end game that no one is paying attention right now and what are the odds of this being turned over by the supreme court. >> there are two thoughts. one is that we should reach out. the other is if we try try hard enough if we can get rid of the voting rights act that allows states that have to change their

voting, we can do these things in virginia, florida, north carolina, and stop some of the demographic trends that are boosting the president. they feel they can succeed and it won't backfire on them. it backfired on 2012 and it could backfire in the future. >> john: i thank you for writing the piece and let's hope that the president's almighty commission does something about the problem. ari berman, thank you for coming. please come back again. >> thank you. >> john: everyone lost during the marco rubio speech. the best time to take a drink was when marco rubio was taking a drink. touchscreens. put that in your dash. now, luxury stuff. make your seats like that. that thing has wifi, why doesn't your car? you can't do that. ignore that guy. give it wifi. yes! make it fit 5 people. no, 5 actual sized people.

give them leg room, good. destroy boring car interiors forever. and that's how you do it. easy. ♪ ♪

>> john: hey, out of power political parties? we need to talk about the state of union rebuttal. it's getting a little ridiculous. don't get they wrong. i like big rebuttals, i cannot lie. but by the end of the president's speech the republicans had already given

their disdainful disrespectful response and it was all done right behind the president by john boehner threw mime. if you count boehner rubio rand paul along with all the g.o.p. congressmen who refused to applaud voting rights, equal pay for women or plans to make. harder for lunatics to shoot lots of people. that's four rebuttals. better yet have the g.o.p. rebuttal then have a liberal rebuttal like bernie saunders and then a far right wing rebuttal and then far left wing rebuttal, and then we could have mass rebuttals and flip over to letterman.

>> john: tweet of the daytime. miles also known as fake republican pointed out one draw

back for minimum wage increase. he tweeted us if walmart employees get races to $9 an hour then they might be able to afford the products they sell. the horror. cheer up. if a small struggling business is trying to make ends meet bike walmart is forced to pay their employees minimum wage. they jack up their prices. it's growth. karl rove says so. now after president obama's state of the union address last night republicans were thirsty for rebuttal, and their savior as "time" magazine put it was a guy who not only can't walk on water but he needs to drink it at the wrong time. senator rubio. last night's g.o.p. response will likely be remembered for the one thing, it was quickly dubbed the sip heard around the world when the sweaty and poorly

lit marco rubio awkwardly took a sip of water. he was asked about it earlier today. >> i needed water. what am i going to do? you know, it happens. god has a funny way of reminding us we're human. >> john: it's funny that he was blaming god that we're human. another way is that we make mistakes and last night senator rubio made his share. one of these mistakes? trying to change history. while trying to prove his point government-bad. private sector-good. >> the major cause of the downtown was the housing crisis caused by policies. >> how they suffered from government policies. here to join me now to talk about the rubio debacle the one and only rick ungar.

>> john: it was like the third act of awakessening. >> the water pailed in comparison to the nervous ticks that were taking place before it. how often do you get a "saturday night live" sketch being written in front of your face. >> john: it kept a lot of media newsnewsmedia taking hup seriously. >> much to his benefit they would have forgotten it. >> john: it may have been mitch daniels who might have deride it had. i want to get off from making fun of him as fun as this is, and get into this. this speech was written long

before president obama gave his. he may have given this speech opening for mitt romney in gainesville. >> when you break this down in parts, the first part had nothing to do with any speech. it was his life story for the 19th time. >> he has a right to do it, he's running for president. >> that's just it. this is supposed to be a rebuttal to the state of the union. it's not supposed to be a campaign speech. >> of course it is. >> they all use it as that, and it destroyed bobby jindal, or as i like to call him mr. rogers. it destroyed his chances and it will destroyed marco rubio. >> john: and it failed for the same talking points as mitt romney. what was the president's old speech that we're not going to have big government. >> it went from opening me, me, me to what you said, what the president was all about. we're not going to have big government. he obviously missed it. then he launched into a speech as if he was running for the

democratic nomination. it's fascinating. i got him figured oh out anything that benefited his family medicare, which was great to his dad as his dad was passing away. his mother depends on it. student loans the bugaboo of the republican party. he got it. if it worked for him then the government is good. >> john: i want to get to the biggest factual error in his attempt to rewrite history and that the housing crisis was not the responsibility of irresponsible and predatory banks but regulation. let's talk about how dishonest that is. >> if anything--what he was going for was deregulation of certain industries. but where he missed if you want to find the blame of what you're talking about is cb cdos. >> john: this is regulation 101. >> you're right.

it has nothing to do with this problem. >> john: 84% of those mortgages came from banks not fanny fannie mae. >> that's absolutely correct. it was banks acting as brokers. they would collect these mortgages, they didn't care what they look like because they could sell them. panel them togetherpackage them together and sell them off. >> john: you don't have to know glass-steagall and repeal to understand how dison the that was. we're low on time. the speech had no new inside and it was the same speech that romney was trying to to sell. is the g.o.p.'s idea is to go against obama. >> there were so many inconsistencies that we would expect from the republicans it

made no sense. it was just tired rhetoric that he's comfortable saying, combined with some democratic support. >> john: you would think they would work with democrats. when the economy gets better they can take credit for it. >> i had the speech before the president began. i got to believe that he could have read the speech before the president gave it. >> john: you know the president's speech writers were insorting north korea all day long. >> we got the speech ahead of time. >> john: this is the savior of the republican party? is it just his heritage? the fact that the tea party used to like him or is this man or bobby jindal going to be the big players. >> clearly it's his heritage. and clearly he doesn't have it. it's been clear to me for a long time. there are many other republicans i can point to and say they have a much better chance of being president. >> john: if handicapped and it's between jeb bush and chris

christie. rick ungar, thank you for sharing your thoughts. come back next week. in case marco rubio's speech wasn't enough, and it wasn't, we will very arrest rand have rand paul on "viewpoint" next.

>> john: hey marco rubio was not the only republican with a reaction speech. senator rand i hate americans with disabilities act paul also spoke on behalf of the tea party. i thought marco rubio was the tea party guy? the two speeches seemed identical, more or less. both criticized obama for borrowing, and slammed him for free market views he doesn't actually hold. paul has more pat answers such as cutting one penny from every dollar that is spent causing widespread suffering among non- non-millionaires. and his attitude is more con descending than marco rubio.

>> what the president fails to grasp is hard work is what made america so prosperous. >> john: that's right. he wants to raise minimum wage because he doesn't want people to be rewarded for their hard work. join my panel. comedian jeff kreisler. author of "get rich cheating" and coproducer of the final edition.com. and comedy writer julie klausner, host of "how was your week" and author of "i don't care about your band." and comedian lee camp, author of "moment of clarity." why do we need two speeches from the republicans. >> because you need more from the id of republicans. marco rubio wants to sing kumbaya. >> that's what kumbaya looks

like now? >> except for the hispanic and hair. >> john: marco rubio was the tea party senator. do they dump them when they start sounding reasonable. >> i don't know if i call him reasonable but they dump people when they stop sounding like ted nugent. if you start supplieding not sounding not crazy. >> john: i didn't say he was more reasonable but he sounds more reasonable. marco rubio is trying to grum himself with this watergate last night to make mad rate. >> he can't declare the representative of the g.o.p.--i don't know if they have koch brother any more. i imagine they're losing that.

they don't have a party any more. >> john: that's true. it will probably fragment. i would like to ask you all this. because it pertains to rand paul. it was rand paul guys who began it those who were disgusted that president bush was spending money. and then it turned into colonial characters blaming president obama. is rand paul trying to be his dad? >> i think rand paul is out there to further himself ride the wave to some sort of fame and fortune. >> but if he doesn't want to be his dad, someone needs to break that to his haircut. >> with you noticed the paul family shrink and becomes whineyer. >> cenk: they don't shrink. the suit got bigger. i'm dying to talking to you about this it took more and a

year for the senate to reauthorize the violence against women act. and when they finally did that, 22 republicans voted know including lindsey graham and rand paul and marco rubio. you're a woman julie. >> thank you. >> john: if i was a political party and i was trying to get women to come back and vote for me wouldn't i bite the bullet and reauthorize the violence against women even if it includes women on reservations and lesbians. >> women on reservations are not women? if you're not with violence against

women or you're for it. >> is this legitimate rape. >> john: the objection is for lgbts in general women who live on reservations and undocumented women. they're giving up on those demographics for votes but do they think people respect paying attention to this. >> even slave owners, well, we got property. native americans we're on the same page. i'm good, guys. >> john: it's lose-lose. >> i'm impressed they read every part of these bills. on anything important they don't see the detention part. but when it comes to an immigrant, the republicans have read every word of the document. >> john: i'll never accuse the democratic party of being especially savvy but if i was running it, wouldn't it be time to pitch really laws.

if he had the anti-dismemberment of puppyies act wouldn't they want to get behind it. >> puppies can't vote. what is so messed up about this, technically we can. but it's not in our best interest. >> but women couldn't either if republicans had their way. >> john: well, now now this are republicans--republican women do run for national office. the war on women, every day, a year ago i thought it was strident for them it use that language, but the g.o.p. are shooting themselves in the foot like barney fife. >> it shows the lipstick on the pig metaphor. they can say they're including this, but when it comes down to t they're still pigs. they can make cosmetic changes but they're still the same people doing the same horrible policies that they pushed for

generations. >> john: back to the old republican civil war former mississippi governor haley barber said donors should not give to the conservative group club for growth. he said he's frustrated with conservative groups who target in primaries. who can blame him. is this the true believer radicals? >> i think we should grab some popcorn and watch much this is dr. frankenstein watching his monster run amok and then is shocked when it comes to destroy his house. they have come to dis-educate the people, and now it's coming home to roost. >> john: lee, what do you think? who will win republican versus tea party. >> those are my choices?

that's like choosing between medical examine and a jay leno monologue. >> john: we'll finally address what everybody is really asking right now. why are people walking around with what looks like dirt on their heads. that's next. now find the most hard core driver in america. that guy, put him in it. what's this? [ male announcer ] tell him he's about to find out. you're about to find out. [ male announcer ] test it. highlight the european chassis 6 speed manual, dual exhaust wide stance, clean lines have him floor it, spin it punch it, drift it put it through its paces is he happy? oh ya, he's happy!

[ male announcer ] and that's how you test your car for fun. easy.

>> john: welcome back. a quick question for my panel. i'm assuming that none of you are giving anything up for lent. if you were, what would you give up? i'll start with you jeff kreisler. >> if i were giving something up for lent, i would give up judaism. >> john: ing it jesus never did.

>> no. >> john: julie? >> i was going to say the same thing. i'll give you 5% of my judaism. >> john: i'm catholic, i promise i'll feel guilty about it. let me ask an atheist who looks like jesus. >> i like governor hickenlooper fracking water. >> you know it's not flammable. >> john: i one time gave up blind allegiance to men who wear funny hats and i found it hard to go back. every year catholics follow lent and the hand stamp that gets you behind the pope's velvet rope.

it's lent leading up to easter. it lasts 40 days to mirror the 40 days jesus fasted and was approached by jesus. for me, ash wednesday is a reminder of repentance when i went to mass with my mom. during lent the faithful give up something that is important to them. deeply meaningful things like facebook. up until this week nobody ever gave up being pope for lent. but like my dad who told my mom before they got married, there is a first time for everything. the pope kept in place the celibacy for priests. before